What is Running Effectiveness?

What is Running Effectiveness?

Imagine you want to run a faster marathon or a faster 5k.

You have a couple of choices.

Improve your fitness

If you’re fitter, you should be able to maintain a higher effort over the event distance.

A higher effort should mean a faster speed, resulting in a quicker finish time.

You can improve your fitness by training, and you can measure fitness improvements by tracking your threshold power.

Improve your effectiveness

Rather than improving your fitness, you could work on how you run.

If you’re more effective at converting your effort (power) into forward motion (speed), you can run faster for the same effort, resulting in a quicker finish time.

You can work on how you run (your running form) using drills, plyometrics, strength and conditioning, and other supplemental work.

But how can you measure whether that work has improved your running form?

Running Effectiveness

Running Effectiveness (RE) was proposed by Andrew Coggan, PhD, and measures how effectively you convert power into speed.

It’s a field-based measure similar to, but different from Running Economy (oxygen consumption at various speeds) or Running Efficiency (external mechanical power vs. metabolic power production), which both require lab-based testing.

👉 RE = speed / power, where speed is in metres per second and power is in Watts per kilogram.

For an easy way to calculate RE from your power meter data, you can use SuperPower Calculator, as demonstrated by Steve Palladino in this video.

For more information on:
🔹 The definition of Running Effectiveness, see WKO4: New Metrics for Running With Power (Coggan)
🔹 How to use Running Effectiveness, see Understanding ‘Running Effectiveness’ and its uses (Palladino)